Yogi beaten by bear necessities of life without food

By Glenda Kwek

But 83-year-old Indian holy man Prahlad Jani, besides apparently missing out on meal times, is also missing the truth, says Australian nutritionist Professor Peter Clifton.

Prahlad Jani, the yogi who says he has had nothing to eat for 70 years and Ellen Greve, a "breatharian" who called herself Jasmuheen.

"I don't believe it's real," says the clinical and nutrition researcher at Baker IDI, a co-author of the CSIRO's Total Wellbeing Diet book.

Professor Clifton says people can survive for days without food or water but not for years.

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"There is a limit to how much your body can shut down [to help you survive] as all the important organs have to keep working.

"So even though the yogi might be able to slow his metabolism right down so that it might only be 20 or 30 per cent of normal ... there's still going to be a point, about 100 to 120 days without food - and without water, it might be 24 days - that he'll die."

How your body copes

The human body is adept at managing starvation, and will stop energy consumption, lower your metabolic rate and conserve salt and water in your body to keep you going, Professor Clifton says.

At first, if you are not eating at all, you use up all the glucose in your body and then move on to the storage form of glucose - glycogen.

The body then starts to making glucose out of muscle. Very soon after that, it switches to ketone, a fat-derived product.

Within a few days or a week, your brain adapts to using fat, and your body then switches over to surviving on it completely.

How long you stay alive after that will depend on how much fat you started out with, Professor Clifton says.

Even though the yogi might be able to slow his metabolism right down so that it might only be 20 or 30 per cent of normal ... there's still going to be a point, about 100 to 120 days without food - and without water, it might be 24 days - that he'll die

"In general if you are an average kind of person, say 75 kilograms and normal BMI (Body Mass Index), once you get down to a BMI of about 12, which means for a male about 42 kilograms, usually at that stage you won't survive, and that's still taking fluid," he says.

"If you don't take fluid, then probably in 15 or 20 days you'll be dead."

And despite Mr Jani's diet - or lack of one - he would still have to urinate daily or his kidneys would fail, Professor Clifton says.

The bearded yogi's one luxury during 15 days at a hospital recently - where he was reported to be under the watchful eyes of Indian military scientists puzzled by his claim - was gargling and bathing occasionally.

"That's cheating," says Professor Clifton, adding: "There should have been no showering if they wanted to do a real test."

Starving to live

Mr Jani is not alone in claiming that he can live without food or water for a long period of time.

Australian woman Ellen Greve, also known as Jasmuheen, claims she practises "breatharianism", a belief that people can live with little to no food or water.

But three followers of the former Brisbane financial consultant died when they tried to live on light.

Two others were jailed in 1999 for the manslaughter of Lani Morris, another breatharianism believer.

Ms Greve was also criticised in Britain after another follower, Australian Verity Linn, died in the Scottish Highlands in 1999 after trying out her 21-day "initiation" fast.

Therese Neumann, a German Catholic born in the late 19th century, is known for her claims she survived for decades on just the Holy Communion.

Even American illusionist David Blaine has tried going without food or nutrients - spending 44 days in a Plexiglas box suspended above the banks of the River Thames in London. He drank a few litres of water a day.

Another group who voluntarily choose not to eat are hunger strikers.

Irish republican Bobby Sands died in 1981 after a 66-day hunger strike in a Northern Ireland prison. Nine other republicans also died after refusing food to protest against the removal of their special status as prisoners.

India's "Father of the Nation", Mahatma Gandhi, fasted several times to protest against the country's then colonial rulers, Britain.

In the wild, animals have been starving themselves for thousands of years - when they are hibernating during winter.

Bears are one example of mammals that fatten themselves up before going into a dormant state, Professor Clifton says.

"So they've got large fat stores, and they obviously got good tissue stores of water as well because they obviously don't drink during that period of time," he says.

"So they are probably quite well adapted to conserving fluid, but at the end of their hibernation period - it might be three or four months - they come out incredibly skinny, and will have to fatten themselves up again.